


Out of Mind

by larxenethefirefly



Series: Out of 'Verse [2]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, NSFW, post gitf
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-29
Updated: 2014-01-29
Packaged: 2018-01-10 10:44:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1158737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/larxenethefirefly/pseuds/larxenethefirefly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post GitF, Rose and the Doctor have to clear the air. Unfortunately, things take a turn for the worse. Can the Doctor earn Rose's forgiveness, or will he lose her forever?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to develish1 for the beta, hand-holding, and late-night emailing sessions. Also thanks to all of you ladies who helped out with this in chat. Your opinions really helped make this ten times better! I've played with this a bit since Dev sent it back, so all errors belong to me.

Rose Tyler was hiding.

He wasn’t so sure he liked that.

Rose Tyler never hid from him. It was always the other way around. Stubborn human that she was, she would always find him, but she never hid from him. He looked in all her usual haunts- her room, the kitchen, the library, the Japanese garden- and even some of her not-so-usual haunts- the medical bay, the insect observatory, squash courts one through... well, all the squash courts- but Rose wasn’t to be found. Even the TARDIS, usually so helpful in granting his desires, was being suspiciously silent and pretending She didn’t hear him. It left the Doctor distinctly unsettled, as if suddenly everyone had fled and he was alone again.

This wouldn’t do. This wouldn’t do at all.

Determined to find his elusive companion, the Doctor would check every single room the TARDIS had, if need be. Rose Tyler couldn’t hide from him. Rose Tyler never hid from him.  
Rose Tyler never left him.

////

She didn’t know where she was, but Rose was ok with that- it meant it would take longer for the Doctor to find her. She knew of the link between the Doctor and his ship, and even though she had asked the TARDIS to keep him away until she was ready, she wasn’t altogether sure that the ship would listen. She and the TARDIS had a sort-of bond ever since the game station, but it was a one-way communication; Rose could talk to the TARDIS all day if she wanted to, but other than a very faint, very vague thrum that she felt more than heard, the TARDIS couldn’t talk back.

A part of her remembered a time when they could, and did, converse; but it was even fuzzier than the events on the game station, even more fuzzy than her earliest childhood memory. It was like a thought or word that skittered just out of reach every time she searched for it, but she still had the overwhelming sense that she knew it had happened.  
She was sitting in the middle of a large room, the only decorations being a small indentation in the wall and a single column, which she was leaning against. The rest of the room was white, a pure, snow-coloured white, the kind of white that made all the other whites look yellow in comparison. It certainly made her ivory nightgown look like a rather unattractive shade of mustard, and she picked at the hem as she replayed the events of the day.

As it had the last twenty times she thought back on it, her heart gave a painful squeeze whenever she remembered the Doctor bursting out of the fireplace, face gleeful, voice excited and proud as he declared, to all and sundry, that he had snogged Madame du Pompadour. It shouldn’t hurt as much as it did. After all, it wasn’t like she and the Doctor were like that; it was just that he was so enraptured with the gorgeous French courtesan that Rose fully accepted what he had been telling her since Sarah Jane- she was replaceable. Not in words, but his actions certainly proved that as soon as she moved on- died, got left behind, held against her will- he would miss her just as long as it took him to find another, prettier, smarter, more- she smiled bitterly- fantastic woman than her. He hadn’t been thinking about Rose while snogging Madame du Pompadour. He certainly didn’t remember her when he had been off dancing- either form, she didn’t know, either hurt just as much since he certainly didn’t do either with her. Even when she was strapped to a table about to be bloody dissected, he hadn’t even made sure she was ok. He was focused on Reinette, only Reinette, and without even a goodbye, he had leapt onto the horse and smashed through the window.

Smashing her heart along with it.

Rose had known all along that he would do whatever it took to preserve the timelines, to keep the universe, earth, and everything in it safe and intact, even if that meant getting stuck in France. But she also thought that sometimes, when the price was too great, he would choose her, instead.

But that wasn’t this him, was it? That was the last him, leather jacket and haunted blue eyes, who was visibly sadder and wearier and yet, in a way, more open and honest than this new Doctor. This Doctor hid even better, behind disarming smiles and mile-a-minute babbling, keeping his cards close to his chest and deflecting anything that could unearth the past. This Doctor wouldn’t hesitate to sacrifice her. No saving the world but losing her. It was saving the world and losing her.

Rose certainly felt lost.

Her legs were pulled to her chest, nightgown adjusted, and her chin rested on her knees. Her arms were wrapped tightly around her legs, holding herself together, holding in the pain, fear, uncertainty, jealousy and abandonment she felt. Her bare feet were slowly being leeched of their warmth against the cool almost-but-not-quite marble of the room, but Rose had been numb long ago. She had come to this room to escape the memories of the TARDIS proper, the white representing a clean slate and an unwritten future.

The question was: what would she write?

Would it be a story with or without him? A story in which she was with him but not with him, acting like best friends with an invisible rift? Another chapter where she learns to hope, only to be forgotten and left behind again, him leaving broken promises in his wake, and her slowly losing her trust and faith in him? A sequel where another was brought onboard, someone who was finally able to take the step that she and the Doctor never could take?

Or would it be a story where she lived the slow path, without him, stuck on earth working in a shop, as if the last two years of her life hadn’t even happened? A life in which she became yet another Sarah Jane, pining for all she had loved and lost only to be cruelly subjected to the love of her life being with another, prettier companion?

Either way, she was bound to lose him. Rose decided that she might as well let go of him now, tuck away her heart, forget what it meant to love an alien and let him fly away without her.

A single tear dropped onto the fabric of her nightgown. She sent a final goodbye.

And the door slid open, revealing the very person she had no wish to see.

////

Five and half hours. That’s how long he had been looking.

He wasn’t certain if he liked the TARDIS’s sense of humour.

She had at least begun to respond to his constant barrage, finally responding after a rather detailed and inventive Gallifreyan curse that surely had every one of his species rolling in their graves at hearing their language being used in such a crude way. It had even shocked his ship enough that She had, in Her surprise, told him that Rose had no wish to be found just yet.

“Just yet?!” he had yelled. “When is she going to be ready?”

His ship had no answer.

“Never mind. I’ll find her anyway.” He had strode onward, getting progressively deeper into the disused parts of his ship, revealing rooms and hallways he had never seen or had long forgotten.

Couldn’t his ship see how much he needed to find her? He couldn’t even feel Rose’s mental presence, the ever-so-faint tickle at the back of his mind. Human thoughts and emotions were always flung about without abandon, but all he could feel was the faint feeling of relief and annoyance from Mickey. Nowhere in his mind could he find the bubbly thoughts and moods of Rose, and her absence slowly ate away at him, leaving dark shadows in its wake. It was too reminiscent of the time after the War, when he had barely clung to life.

During those days, when his paralyzed body slowly fought its way to life and the regeneration took several long, agonizing days followed by weeks of regeneration sickness lying on the ruined, splintered floor of the console room, his mind had been lost in the silence left behind. Lost in the void of Gallifrey’s death and alone in time and space, he and the TARDIS had screamed in pain and anger and sorrow. He had barely put forth the effort to live, and it was still with an empty mind and hollow heart that he had stumbled into an Earth department store and found the mind of a nineteen year old human that slotted perfectly into his. For that brief moment the silence and emptiness had been bearable, and hearing her say ‘no’ had broken him. Going back to ask her for a second time just proved that he was desperate for the comfort and company her presence provided. Ever since then he had slowly became more and more dependent on that tickle at the back of his mind, until even the slightest recoil felt like he was sinking back into darkness.

Now, with her completely removed from his mind, it seemed like he was once more left in the shattered console room, clinging to life against his will and fear clawing up from his soul to lodge itself in his throat. The longer he searched the more frantic he became, until he was ready to tear apart the room and rip the doors from their hinges.

The TARDIS let Her displeasure show, trying to distract him with objects and rooms that would have delighted him on any other day, but he ignored Her and continued with single-minded determination. Eventually She had given up, leaving his mind with the mental equivalent of throwing up Her hands and leaving in a huff, a strong sense of warning lingering in the temporarily closed-off link as She finally showed him the room Rose had escaped to.

Ignoring both warning and displeasure, he opened to door and took in the sight of Rose.

She was sitting, blank-faced and curled in on herself, against a pillar. He recognized the room; once upon a time it had been used as a place for virtual reality games, but had since been adapted as a psychic dampening chamber. Not quite as potent as the Zero room, but that had been lost in the War and he had to make do. The panel by the door, which set the dampening field’s intensity, was currently at five; he assumed it was the TARDIS’s doing, since Rose would hardly know what it was, never mind how to use it. The other dial, the one he really couldn’t remember right now, was set at maximum; he would solve that puzzle later. The first dial indicated that she really did want to be alone, then; but he had found her, and her mind was once more tickling in his head, but this time it was resonating with sorrow and acceptance and a finality that scared him.

“What are you doing?” he demanded, and even he was startled at the anger he heard in the words.

Rose’s gaze shifted back to the floor. “Thinking.”

“About what?”

She shrugged. “Just thinking.”

His tone was accusing. “And you had to hide from me to think?”

“What of it? You do it to me all the time.”

Which was true, but he didn’t want to dwell on that just now. “You don’t hide from me, Rose.”

Her head snapped up, and the look in her eyes unnerved him. They were… empty. “Well, maybe I do now. Maybe I wanted to. Maybe I should have done, long ago.”

The Doctor’s eyes narrowed and he stepped further into the room, the door closing behind him, sealing them off from both the TARDIS and Mickey. “You what?”

“I said,” and here her voice grew stronger, her eyes more hard, “Maybe I should have hid from you long ago.”

His hearts were racing, blood thrumming through his veins, his lungs providing maximum oxygen to his cells and every sense on overdrive. Biologically, he was in fight-or-flight mode, mentally, he was in fight-or-die mode. Fight against Rose, fight with Rose, didn’t matter, for her presence in his mind was withdrawing, changing, and he knew that without it the madness that had been creeping up on him since she had hidden would win out.

He could feel his pupils dilate, letting in more light, the room almost blinding him. She was surrounded in blazing intensity, matched by the fire in her eyes, and a part of him long thought unneeded stirred into life.

“You,” he said lowly, “cannot hide from me.”

He was three feet from her now, almost looming, with his hands shoved into pockets and the storm in his eyes. Rose didn’t care. He didn’t scare her, not anymore, and besides, she was not his to scare, not his to do anything to.

Slowly, she stood, nightgown fluttering and shifting as it settled. Her heart stayed calm, her hands loose, but her voice was tight and angry. “I can bloody well do as I like. You certainly didn’t seem to care whether I lived or died earlier, whether I was stuck or not, so why should you care where I am now? Looks like to me you’re only settling for second best now that Reinette’s gone.” For a second she seemed to wilt. “And I get it, I really do. She was beautiful, accomplished, talented, knew how to get inside men’s heads and how to treat them. A shop girl from the twenty-first century is like a marigold compared to a rose. And I saw it, with Sarah-Jane, but I didn’t want to acknowledge it. You can replace us in a heartbeat, without a second thought, without regret.” She took a breath, mentally rallied the troops and barricades and stone walls around her heart, and met his gaze. “No matter what you lead us to think, no matter what we believe, you are never ours. Not completely. I know now that whatever I think, whatever I become, it’s never enough. I’m not what you’re looking for, in the grand scheme of things. You’re lonely, Doctor, and she understood you. She understood your life; saw your fears and dreams and what drove you. She got inside your head, the only thing that belongs truly, completely to you, and you allowed her. You allowed her in, allowed her to see the essence of what you are. You never let me. And that’s ok. I always knew that it was only a matter of time until you tired of me, anyway. Though leaving me stranded on an abandoned space station wasn’t how I thought it would happen, especially after you promised that you wouldn’t. Not to me.”

The tickle at the back of his mind told him all he needed to know, even without her words to support it- Rose was hardening, protecting herself from him. She no longer trusted him, couldn’t bring herself to believe in him, despite her honesty. The sensation was almost worse than any torture he had endured. Rose never gave up on him. She supported him, guided him, saved him.

Now, she was only saving herself. It was every fear realized, this, the fear that he would ruin her, ruin her innocence and love and light. She had always been so strong, and it had taken him this long to realize that only he could truly break her.

“You think I abandoned you?” he asked, stepping closer. “You think I wouldn’t have fought to get back to you?”

Rose crossed her arms. “You didn’t even know the name of the spaceship.”

She was right, he realized. Even if he had managed to get his hands on a vortex manipulator or other time travel device —or, worse, hitched a ride with a previous self- he wouldn’t even know where to go. He knew the specific date, time, and year, but not the place. He could spend a millennia searching the stars and not even cover a quarter of the universe.

That, he decided, could be dealt with later. Right now, he needed Rose back.

“I,” he told her, taking a step forward, watching as a brief wave of uncertainty flickered in her eyes, “would have found my way back. I would have come back to you. I wouldn’t have left you.”

“You did, though, didn’t you?” she shot back. “There was room for two on that bloody horse. The TARDIS could have been used to break through the glass; you’ve flown Her before! Instead it was ‘Reneitte this’ and ‘Madame de Bloody Pompadour that’ while I was strapped to a table about to get dissected for parts!”

Another step. “But you didn’t, did you?”

The glare she gave him would have frozen the blood of a lesser being. “It wouldn’t have mattered if I had, would it? You barely sent a glance my way the whole time; for all you know I could have been wounded and you didn’t even stop to check.”

“I knew, Rose. If you had been cut open- if you had gotten even one scratch on you, I would have known. I would have smelled it. Iron, and pain; you humans have no sense of control, and I can sense every single thing. Like now,” he said, and took his last step; there was only the smallest of distance between them, and he felt like he could already feel her pressed against him, their breath mingling in the air in front of them, her heart pounding against her ribcage, trying to escape. “I can sense your anger, in the speed of your heart; your body is pumping out adrenaline, readying itself for a fight. There’s salt, from tears, still lingering on your face; and I can still smell your fear, from the spaceship.” Bending forward ever so slightly, his cheek level with hers, he whispered in her ear. “And, just faintly, trapped in a layer of satin, I can smell your arousal. You like this, don’t you, Rose? You still want me.”

He felt Rose shiver, ever so slightly. Smirking, he raised one hand to her waist-

-and was shoved backwards with more strength than he knew she possessed.

“Don’t you dare touch me,” she spat, the sudden flare of her anger roaring through his mind. “I’m not going to be second fiddle because you couldn’t get the courtesan. I may be just a shop girl, but I have my pride. Get out.”

He stared at her, balance regained, and took the tiniest of steps toward her. “What?”

Her hands were clenched, eyes sparking in fury, chest heaving; his trousers, already starting to feel a little small, seemingly shrunk three sizes. Rose, had she been paying attention, would have been even more furious. “I said get out. You are leaving, and taking me back home. I’m not your plaything, I-“

This time, she was the one shoved backwards, his hands gripping her upper arms hard enough to bruise, her back against the pillar. His entire body was pressed up against her, long and lean, and it would have been her wildest dream personified if she wasn’t so angry and hurt and confused. She had steeled her heart against him, had said her goodbyes, and now he decided he wanted her?

He was nothing if inconsistent, and right now, she wanted him gone.

“You’re not leaving me,” he growled.

Rose’s eyes narrowed. “What, you’re going to keep me hostage now, is that it? Lock me in a room, delivering my meals through a slot in the door, only visiting me when you want to fuck? Is that it?”

A part of her mind wondered where these words were coming from; this was the Doctor, and for all his darkness, she knew he would never hurt her like that. Break her heart, yes, but never her spirit.

His eyes were dark chips, and she knew that he was truly angry. Time Lord eyes don’t expand and contract like a human’s; while the pupil gets larger, it also elongates, resembling those of a cat’s- or a snake’s. Only the faintest streak of brown rimmed his pupils now.

His voice was low when he responded. “You think that’s what you are to me, Rose? A cheap trick, a fuck buddy, a whore?”

“Never have hinted otherwise, and judging from this, it seems cheap whore is your type of girl.”

His mouth slammed into hers, his tongue invading, twisting, and dominating. Rose struggled, trying to escape his iron grip, mouth fighting to close, body pressing against the pillar, doing everything possible to get away, and get away now. He simply followed her, teeth clashing and nose bumping, and no matter how many times she tried biting him it only seemed to excite him further. She could feel him against the join of her thighs, grinding against her, hard and thick and everything she ever imagined but couldn’t allow herself to want again. Despite her wishes, though, her body had different ideas, and judging from the smirk she felt curl against her lips, he knew it.

Finally slipping out of her mouth, his breaths puffed against her swollen lips. His voice barely more than a whisper, she heard him say, “Do you believe this feels like I don’t want you? That I don’t crave you?”

She stared defiantly to the right, head twisted away as far she could get it. “I don’t know what to believe anymore.”

The Doctor chuckled, low and dark and god, she shouldn’t be reacting like this, shouldn’t be encouraging him. “You don’t have to believe; just feel,” he murmured against the shell of her ear, before she felt the barest of pressure from his mouth. He lingered there for a moment, before lightly scraping her earlobe on the way down. His tongue came into play, leaving a cold trail down her neck to settle at the joint of her shoulder, and she hissed in pain and pleasure when he sucked. There was no doubt in her mind that he was leaving a mark; a claim, and a reminder, that whether she wanted him to or not, he was taking her as his.

Not willing to relinquish her arms in case she tried to slap him- or, worse, escape- he studied her nightgown. By some miracle he was almost willing to pray in thanks for it was front tying and the laces played peek-a-boo with her skin, showing tantalizing glimpses but not enough for what he wanted. Unacceptable, he decided, and pulled the laces with his teeth.

In a few quick motions he had the front of her nightgown splayed open, the laces coming to an end just below her breasts. Rose shuddered as he nuzzled his way up and down the exposed area before revealing her breasts; her nipples contracted as they hit the chilled air, and he watched with a gleam in his eyes before taking the left one slowly, carefully, into his mouth.

Despite her wishes, Rose gasped, her hips shifting forward the tiniest amount. It had been long, too long, since she had last been with a man, even before she had joined the Doctor in his crazy, wonderful adventures. Her body was betraying her, craving the contact, and Rose wasn’t certain if her heart and mind could hold out.

“So beautiful,” he murmured, his tongue lingering, pressing hard over the small pearl. “So responsive, just for me…”

Rose shook her head weakly. “Go away.”

He nipped at her, the pain mingling with the pleasure that was coursing through her. “No.”

Once more tracing a path up her chest to her neck, he lapped at the curve of her cheek, and it was only then that Rose realized that she was crying. “Don’t be scared, my Rose. For you are mine, and I’m never, never going to hurt you...”

His chest was pressing against hers, the coarse fabric of his suit jacket stimulating her chest, making her nerves spark and sizzle and join in the growing ache between her thighs. She realized, belatedly, that he had released her arms, but he kept murmuring in her ear, honey-tinted poison dripping from his lips. Over and over, all she could see was him crashing through the mirror, dancing and dancing with Reinette, giddy from kissing her. She heard a rustle of fabric, and he sighed, one less barrier between them physically but the walls around her heart remained strong.

“Don’t…” she began, but he pressed his lips to hers, silencing her.

His hands clutched at her waist, bunching up the fabric, and though he went slowly she could feel the tremor of his skin, the barely repressed hunger of his touch and the dark need to claim her. One of his hands reached down, wiggling itself between her legs, and her body betrayed her once more by opening to him, screaming out for his touch. The hand cupped her, testing her wetness, judging how ready she was, and he made a strange whimper-growl in the back of his throat as the radiating heat seared his skin.

“My Rose,” he muttered as her knickers were dragged down. He hitched up one of her legs, nestled himself at her entrance, bent his knees, positioned himself. “Look at me, my Rose.”

She shook her head again.

“Look at me.”

There it was again, that trace of darkness, the revealing of the mania and madness that lingered just below the skin. When she still refused a hand reached up and grabbed her chin, firmly turning her head. Her eyes slammed closed, hands clenching into fists, and he growled again.

Lifting up ever so slightly, he rested himself at her entrance, moving backwards and forwards oh so slowly, giving her just a glimpse of what she could have. “Open your eyes Rose,” He cooed, his hand tightening, squeezing. “Let me see your eyes.”

“No,” she whispered.

“Open. Your. Eyes.” He growled.

Her heart squeezed painfully, her mind screamed no, but Rose obeyed, staring into the black slits. They filled her vision, making her dizzy, and his grin was almost sinful.

“There you are.” He shifted once more, hands pushing up on her bum, eyes intent on hers. Almost mechanically she responded to his urgent hands and wrapped her legs around his waist, bony angles pressing into her skin. With one fluid motion he surged upwards and let her down. He was inside her, she around him, and though her body was singing out at last! Her heart was shattering, breaking, falling victim to his power. Biting back a sob, Rose leaned her head back, staring at the ceiling, and wished it to be over.

“You feel so good,” he moaned into her ear, hands grasping and clutching, hips thrusting and grinding. “Hot, tight, wet… so good.”

Rose whimpered as one hand clumsily began to rub at her clit, his sole arm holding her weight. She could see the bruises forming on her arms, his wiry frame deceptive of the strength that lay underneath the skin. The sound seemed to excite him, his thrusts getting harder, more painful, zinging through her spine where it was lost in translation and was transformed into pleasure. Biting her lip, Rose scrabbled at the cool surface behind her, not knowing if he would be caring enough to catch her if she fell.

“Please stop…” she breathed, but it was lost in his grunts, in the slap of skin against skin, in the roaring in her mind and heart.

She had wanted this, once upon a time. Wanted the push and pull, the feeling of him inside her, naked skin against naked skin and hands mapping out bodies. But not like this. Not… not when he had left her, not if she became nothing more than a toy, not like he was now.

Alien, she remembered.

It hadn’t seemed so obvious until now.

The Doctor lapped at her skin. “You’re scared of me now, aren’t you Rose? Scared of this side of me, scared of just how much power I have over you.” He crooned into her ear. “And oh, how much power I have… I can feel every nerve, every sweet spot, every little area that makes you squirm and moan and gasp.” As if to prove his point he pinched her clit and rolled it between his nails, causing her to cry out at the sudden rush and her arms jerk toward him. He smirked. “I can feel you in my mind, Rose. Feel your every emotion, every time you’ve craved me, fingered yourself to thoughts of me, dreamed about me. If you only knew, Rose, how many times I’ve watched you as you dreamed, heard your whimpers and sighs and moans. How many times I’ve touched myself as you did.”

“Shut up,” she muttered.

“I don’t think I will. Not until you come, Rose. I want to feel you come. Feel you clamp around me, feel your body betray you, greedily milking me for every last drop. I want to make you scream, Rose Tyler, scream loud enough for your voice to echo and let your boyfriend know who you now belong too. You are mine.”

His fingers left her clit, and she gave a sob for the relief and desire for more. They touched her temple, and before she could do so much as blink, his mind dove into hers, touching the pleasure centres of her mind, stimulating her nervous system and sending every touch into hypersensitivity. It was too much, too fast; her entire body convulsed and contracted, and she fell into the guiltiest yet most intense orgasm she ever had. He came within her with a shout of dark triumph, filling her, as she squeezed painfully and continuously around him. He breathed heavily against her neck as he spiralled downward, and Rose realized her head was resting against his shoulder.

“Mine,” he whispered in her ear, before slipping out and away and letting her body slide down and her feet settle firmly on the floor. His eyes were still dilated, dark and eerie. His hand rose, cupping her cheek in a mockery of comfort. “You are never to leave me, Rose Tyler, you hear? You. Are. Mine.”

And with that, he tucked himself away and zipped up his trousers, eyes still locked with hers, before turning and leaving the room.

Rose slowly slid down the pillar, tears falling harshly from her face, but she dared not make a sound. He didn’t look back, and within moments, all Rose was left with was fluid leaking down her thigh and her nightgown still open and undone.

She didn’t leave for a long time.  



	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor realizes what he's done, and begs Rose's forgiveness. Despite her doubts, she allows him another chance.

Rose hadn’t seen the Doctor in three days. She had made certain of it. 

She knew that she would have to see him eventually; it was his ship, after all, and eventually the TARDIS would tell him where to go or make her run into him, but she didn’t want to see him. Couldn’t see him, not after what had happened.

She had used those three days to pack. Knick knacks from various alien planets were shoved into drawers once filled with sleep wear, and every single one of her white nightgowns was thrown into the incinerator. Long sleeves took the place of tank tops and t-shirts, and blue jeans with belts replaced shorts and denim skirts. Mickey noticed the change in attire, but when he asked about it she lied and said that her room frequently got cold. He offered her his room, and Rose had to hold herself back from running in fear. Declining politely she ensconced herself in the deepest part of the library, where Mickey wouldn’t bother to wander and where he would never think to look for her. This section was filled with history’s greatest wars, Earth and otherwise, and Rose would simply stare at the wall for hours until it was time for bed. If she heard someone coming down the hallway while moving around the ship, she would duck into the nearest room and hide until the sounds passed or her imagination died down. 

Three days of running. Three days of hiding. 

On the fourth day, the TARDIS left the Vortex, and Mickey dragged Rose to the console to see where they had landed.

Rose avoided looking at him. She knew where he was, what he looked like as he studied the console readout. His voice, when he spoke, made her want to throw up.

“Here we are then! Gitsum, year thirty-four twenty-four on the New Reginald Calendar, home of miniature dragons and flowers that explode if looked at the wrong way. And this century’s best footie match against the Greater Swampers and Capitol Patriots.” He waggled his eyebrows at them.

“Can’t wait!” Mickey said, happily, as he rushed to the door. 

Rose followed slowly, freezing when she heard a soft, “Rose?”

Mickey had the door open and was already staring around in awe. She was so close… just ten more steps… “Yes?”

“I thought… I thought we could let Mickey do this alone. There’s something I want to show you.”

Mickey was already running to the entry queue, chatting up a humanoid figure that looked vaguely like a lobster. “I thought we were stopping here.”

“We are,” he replied. “Same planet, just a different part.” He walked past her, easing around her, and his arm brushed hers the faintest amount. Rose jerked, stumbling back, grabbing onto the jump seat and clinging. The Doctor’s back stiffened slightly, but the doors were shortly closed and he soon returned to the console, eyes downcast.

Rose kept the jump seat between them, barely even feeling the TARDIS take off and land. Only the distinctive noises from the Time Rotor gave it away, and he turned to look at her, uneasily.

“We’re here.”

Rose made no motion to move, so he slowly walked towards the doors. When there was space enough between them, Rose silently followed, closing the door and leaning against the familiar feel of the TARDIS. Within seconds the memory she had been trying to avoid flashed through her thoughts, and she stumbled away, heart quickening and palms sweating.

The Doctor had his back to her, standing on a small bluff overlooking a field enflamed with crimson and orange flowers. It stretched on for miles, rippling in the invisible wind, and Rose breathed in the scent of honey and thyme.

When he spoke, it was with a quiet reverence. “The people on this planet consider that field holy. It’s made up of millions of sentient flowers that live off of the contentment and joy of those around it. Pick one, and it is cut off from its brethren and dies within minutes. Each one comes from a single root, and forms a system so vast and interconnected not even the most skilled historian, botanist, or time traveller can tell which the first was.” He smiled wryly. “Even the TARDIS doesn’t know.

“The flowers share the same mind, and where one is suffering another gives in excess. If one catches disease the others lend it their own life forces to fight it off. When one dies, its nutrients fall into the soil to feed and nurture the others around it. It’s the largest population of life on this planet, and the Gitsums worship these flowers so much they based their entire culture around them.”

She sighed. “Why are you telling me this?”

He turned to look at her, eyes sad. “I made a mistake, Rose. I promised you I’d never leave, and within twenty-four hours I did it anyway. And instead of asking for forgiveness like I should have, I got scared, and reacted in the worst way possible.” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Before I met you, I felt like I was barely clinging on to life. I welcomed death at every opportunity, throwing myself into every dangerous situation I could find in the hopes that I wouldn’t make it out. Whenever I tried to, there was always something preventing me from doing so. I even hitched a ride on the titanic, intending to go down with the ship, but as I was standing on the deck a man handed me his daughter and told me to get her to safety while he looked for his wife. I couldn’t let an innocent child die, and so I went to a lifeboat, intending to jump out as soon as I hit water. The boat ended up capsizing when swimmers tried to climb on board, but we had drifted by the iceberg itself. I ended up helping the women and children cling to the iceberg while the others righted the boat and was dragged on myself when it was stable. It took me another three months just to get back to the TARDIS, and after that I ended up in London, 2005, where a shop girl was trapped by animated shop window dummies. I fully intended to die in that explosion, Rose, but all I could think about was a young girl, so full of life and asking so many right questions… I could see your potential, your brilliance, and before I knew it I couldn’t stay away.”

Rose laughed bitterly. “And yet, you were always so keen on sending me away.”

“I’m an old man, Rose,” he sighed. “So old, older than I can even remember, and scared. I’ve never had something like this happen before, never actually needed a person so much that just the thought of them leaving me nearly paralyzes my entire body. And I’ve been stuck in the same rut for so long I don’t know how to get out of it.”

Rose studied him. Ever since the beginning she’d known how to read him like an open book, and even after he changed she could pick out his feelings in moments. Right now, the uneasy shifting from foot to foot, hands dug deep in his pockets and shoulders hunched, he was truly remorseful. Ruffling the back of the head indicated embarrassment, tugging on the ear meant uncertainty or white lies.

It was always the big lies she had to look out for. Like when he’d sent her back in the TARDIS, or that time when they were captured by those rogue soldiers and he assured her that he was only being detained for questioning, and it turned out he was almost executed. Those times it was almost impossible to realize until after the fact, when she realized that the light in his eyes wasn’t excitement or reassurance but dread and sorrow. When his motions were slightly jerky and a little over the top, his smiles too big and eager. She always fell for it, wanting to believe too much to see through the lie.

But that was the problem, wasn’t it? She had always believed in him, and he had played with that belief and twisted it. She wasn’t sure if she was willing to let him in again, let him have that power over her. He may have controlled her body, but her mind was hers alone; she couldn’t allow him to get close to her.

A pained expression crossed his face as he felt her fear and determination. Whatever had caused him to react that way in that room was more damaging than helpful. It had allowed him to ignore his fears, to take that step he craved but never acted on, but it had hurt Rose in the process, scarred her. If that was the result he wished it had never happened, that things had happened differently, even if it would have taken another three years to happen. She still loved him, he knew that, but there was a point where even love wasn’t enough to sustain someone. There needed to be trust as well, and he had completely ruined that.

It would take a miracle, he decided, an impossible miracle, to get that trust back.

Then again, impossible was just a word, wasn’t it? He never really put much faith in it before, why start now?

“Time Lords were a lot like those flowers, Rose.” He said, and by her expression he had startled her. “We were all connected in our minds, and everywhere I went I could feel them in the back of my mind, something like white noise, easily tuned out but comforting. When I lost them… imagine, Rose, imagine living with something every single day of your life, maybe the sound of people talking in the flat next to you, or cars going by your house. It’s with you when you wake, when you sleep, even when you cover it up with other noise. And then one day, those neighbours move, or the road is closed, and suddenly you’re left without that noise. The world is suddenly too silent, and you can’t seem to think of anything but that noise, and it’s hard to fall asleep without it. Sure, you try to find an approximation of it- maybe you leave the television on, maybe you turn on the radio- but you can’t quite replace it. I’m like that flower, Rose, suddenly removed from all those other flowers, and all I can think of is that I’m alone, and where there was a cacophony of noise and feelings and thoughts tumbling over each other and fighting each other there’s nothing.”

“You’re saying you’re a flower?” she asked, sceptically, whereas before she would have been teasing him. But it’s something, it’s a start, and he grabs the chance desperately.

“I’m exactly like that flower. In my desperation to fill that noise I’ve substitute other things, tried to find distractions; but until you, Rose, until you I’ve never been able to. I can… I can feel you in my mind, buzzing ever so faintly, but strong enough to alleviate the silence. Humans have no desire or knowledge on how to shield their minds so I can feel them all the time, but you rise above them all, Rose. You… You’re so loud, so prominent, and with you there I don’t need to pretend anymore, Rose.”

He had been creeping closer, slowly, as if approaching a wild animal; and hadn’t she been once, glowing golden and fierce and protecting him with a wave of her hand, a flash of her eyes? She may not remember, but the Wolf still lingered, in the way her eyes glowed in the sunlight, in the way she smiled at their captors. 

Rose tensed, and he stopped, less than a foot from her. Her arms were crossed across herself defensively, cuffs pulled over hands as far as they would go. He knew this was her armour, knew that she was hiding from him, and his hearts clenched.

“I’m so, so sorry, Rose. I never meant to hurt you. I acted on instinct, on fear, and it only ended up hurting you. If I could go back and change it, I would.”

She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter, Doctor, about what you want to do. It’s about what you did. What you will do again. You left me, after promising me you wouldn’t, and then you…” she shivered. “I should leave you. I should leave, right now, and never look back. My bags are packed; all I have to do is grab them and walk out those doors. And you won’t be able to stop me.”

Barely resisting the urge to grab onto her and never let her go, he nods mutely.

Rose stared at him, as if testing his resilience. His eyes never left hers, and he felt the presence in the back of his head wavering.

“You hurt me,” she said, voice hard. 

“Yes.” He whispered hoarsely.

“Why should I stay?”

There were so many reasons why. Thousands that he could list off the top of his head, from serious to whimsical, from I couldn’t live without you to your eyes are beautiful to I pretend to be annoyed when you leave your towels on the bathroom floor, but I’m not, not at all, because it means you’re here with me, but nothing seemed adequate. There was only one thing he could say that would ensure her staying, but whether or not he could say it was a different matter entirely.

But seeing her like this, eyes flashing, arms crossed, body tensed and ready to run, he figured it was worth whatever pain it could bring.

Slowly, hesitantly, he stepped forward, and with infinite tenderness he laid his hands on her shoulders, never breaking eye contact. She was tense, almost quivering, under his touch, and he swallowed before saying the words that would either bring about his destruction or salvation: 

“Because I love you.”

Rose froze, eyes wide, body stilling, and it seemed her heart and lungs and brain froze for a split second. Then she wrenched away and slapped him.

“Don’t say that!” She shouted, tears streaming down her face. “You can’t… you can’t say that, not after… you don’t… it’s not fair!”

Palms up, voice pleading, he begged, “Rose…”

She shook her head, palms digging into her eyes. “You can’t… why now? Doctor, I would have given anything, everything, before… it’s not fair! You don’t get to do this to me again! I can’t let you!”

“Please!” he cried out, desperately, hands fluttering uncertainly before digging themselves into his hair, pulling viciously. “I mean it, Rose. I should have said it sooner, but I was scared. I’m a coward, every time. A coward to wait this long, a coward to say it so you won’t leave, a coward to run from you! I ran from you, Rose, because I was scared of what you do to me. Over a thousand years, and I’ve never felt like this! So I ran, selfishly, because I couldn’t think of what it would do to you, what suffocating under all this uncertainty and tensions and wonderings would do. Please, Rose, I screwed up, screwed up one of the best things that’s ever happened to me, and I’m willing to make things right but you have to help me too!”

She was still crying, letting out huge wracking sobs that tore into his heart every time they were uttered. He gathered her to him, loosely, allowing her to break free if she wanted to. “Please, Rose, please forgive me. I’ll do anything, anything, I swear. I’ll have dinner with your mum every night for a month without complaining, watch as many Eastenders reruns as you want, discuss the finer points of that Thorlaxian soap opera you just discovered… I won’t drag you along on shopping for TARDIS parts, either, and carry all of your bags when you go shopping! Just… give me another chance, Rose, please. I swear I won’t mess this up.”

Her tears had slowed, but she still sniffled as she said, weakly, “It doesn’t work like that.”

“It doesn’t? Or you won’t allow it too?”

She pulled back, and he let her go. She rubbed at the tear tracks and mascara smears, and he offered her a hanky from his pocket. Rose accepted it to remove the worst of the stains and blow her nose, before finally replying. “I don’t’ know if I’ll be able to forgive you, Doctor. If… if I decide to, I’ll let you know. Until then…” her voice trailed off.

His grin was so wide he wondered if it would take flight and achieve orbit. “Of course, yes! I swear I’ll do everything I can, Rose. All my spare time entirely dedicated to Rose Tyler, just you see!” he paused. “Even… even if that means dinner with your mum for a week.”

Rose sniffled again, but he was rewarded with the tiniest of smiles.

It would have to be enough for now.

~*~

They had picked Mickey up at the end of the day, Rose taking the time until then to sit in her room and think. Completely plastered from both the game and the after-party, Mickey made it as far as the jump seat before he threw up. The Doctor suffered through with good humour and even cleaned without complaining. Rose knew he was trying, but couldn’t help but wonder how long it would last.

But last it did, and Rose found herself with no decision made even after several months. The Doctor had been the model gentlemen, taking her everywhere she wanted and needed to go, bantering back when Mickey made domesticated jokes and not once made a single noise of complaint when she asked to visit her mum. She had thrown every little thing she could think of at him- week long shopping trips, beach after beach, spas, many, many requests for chips, even a petting zoo. He would take them there without complaint, finding somewhere for Mickey to have some fun or keeping him on the ship, while Rose went and got pampered or simply sunbathed and he did whatever it was he did when she was otherwise occupied. 

There were occasions that he would surprise her. Once, Rose was exiting the spa that she had been at for the day, and he was waiting for her with a bouquet of alien flowers that smelled like bananas, but looked like blue octopi. Another time she mentioned in a conversation to Mickey that she had wanted to learn how to ride a horse, and two days later the Doctor had brought her a human colony on Montana (the planet, not the state) where the thirty-third century equivalent of cowboys taught her how to ride over the course of a week. The Doctor sat and watched the lessons, and when she flirted only the tiniest deepening of the lines around his eyes indicated that he was upset. It was one of the best weeks of Rose’s life outside the TARDIS, and she realized why the Doctor had wanted to keep the horse from the space station, even if they had nowhere to put it. It was also the first time that the thought of the space station didn’t hurt.

They would still find trouble, but the incidents were few and far between and hardly worth considering. During these moments Rose realized they still worked like a well-oiled machine despite the tension between them. She knew, as she helped the Doctor stop whatever problem had interrupted their visit, that she truly did miss being with him, missed the laughter and the jokes and the teasing. It made her wonder if they could ever get that back and when he turned to grin at her and babble insanely, she realized that they already were like that in the very basis of their existence. All she had to do was give him another chance, and let him into her heart. The thought scared her, but at the same time it brought about a sudden burst of clarity: she wanted him back.

Eventually, Mickey asked to leave, tired of a tour of the universe’s most girly hot spots, even if they had been interspersed with a little excitement and once, a massive brainwashing scheme which he had been a victim of. The Doctor had looked to her, leaving it her decision, and no one was more surprised than Rose when she hugged Mickey goodbye and apologized for the lack of running and explosions.

“Don’t need to apologize for that,” he had said once they were out of earshot from the Doctor. “Just promise me that you two will make up, yeah? It took me a while to figure it out, but you and him, it was meant to be.”

Rose couldn’t speak around the lump in her throat, but she managed a hoarse “yeah” and pulled him tight. “Good luck, Mickey. I know there’s someone out there for ya.”

“See ya later, babe. It may not have been the most exciting time for me, but I wouldn’t have traded a moment of it.”

And so Rose returned to the TARDIS alone, and began to test herself as well.

Outfits became more daring, once her bruises had faded; she returned to tank tops and skirts, low cut t-shirts and hip huggers. Not to test his reaction, but hers, as well; those clothes made her feel confident, womanly, and she wanted to see if she wanted him for him, not because her body thought it did. She would sometimes get that tingle up and down her spine whenever he frankly admired her, telling her she was beautiful, adorable, and once, sexy. He had quickly changed the topic after that, not wanting to push her or deliver the wrong message, and Rose found herself falling the tiniest bit more.

Months had gone by, and Rose still had yet to reach a decision.

It was time to test him one more time.

Rose padded to the control room, dressed in a flattering red top and dark shorts, hair piled in a knot on her head and strappy red sandals covering her feet. The Doctor was under the console replacing some coils, banging and swearing as he did so, and Rose leaned forward over the console (just enough to give a hint of cleavage) and asked, “How much longer?” 

“Oh, another minute or so, I should think. This last one is being a bit difficult, and it’s a tighter fit than I would like, but I have to make do with what I got.” There were a few more bangs, a buzz from the sonic, and what sounded like metal scraping against metal before he let out a large sigh. “There’s that done, then. She should be good for now, but I need to keep an eye on some of those wires. They’re fraying again.” He wriggled out from under the console, and after dusting off his trousers and giving his hair a quick ruffle, turned to her and grinned. “Where to now?”

She saw the exact moment he noticed her cleavage, but he instantly diverted his eyes to her face and stayed there. Rose stood back up and walked over to the jump seat, draping herself across it and giving him the barest flash of her bum as she did so. “What about Barcelona? We still haven’t been there.”

He beamed. “Barcelona, coming right up! You’ll love the noseless dogs, Rose, and they even have earless cats! Their whiskers interpret sound waves, and they double as antennae to send signals to others of their species. Their way of communicating is extremely delicate, and losing just one whisker can change the way they interpret sound waves drastically. Instead of hearing footprints, they hear ocean waves instead, or instead of hearing music played they think it’s a fly buzzing about. It’s similar to the Thorlixians, except they have sensors in the pads of their feet, so they have to walk everywhere barefooted. They have created the softest carpet you’ll ever try, and if you ask nicely enough, I’m pretty sure the TARDIS might be able to find some for you…”

He continued to babble as he piloted the TARDIS, checking readouts every so often and picking a time and place to go to. Rose let his voice wash over her, his excited, indulgent tones washing away the last remnants of the dark, angry man he had become to her. By the time they had landed he was talking about some sort of delicacy in the Gamma Rho quadrant, and Rose happily took his hand as they stepped out onto Barcelona for the first time. 

“Oh, it’s beautiful!” she exclaimed. Everything seemed to be carved from glass; buildings were giant, brilliant mosaics, masterpieces that would have made the greatest artist from every century on Earth turn green with envy. The sunlight made everything glow with an otherworldly brilliance, and somehow the colours seemed sharper, more real, than any other colours before. The red on her shirt seemed washed out and faded compared to the red on the building next to her; the brown of the Doctor’s coat was sad and grey next to the design of wood bark on the corner. Even the streets seemed to be made of a pure white glass, tinkling merrily as they walked, music swelling up in an orchestra around them as the planet’s inhabitants and other tourists tapped out their own melody. 

“Mum would kill to have something like this in her house,” Rose breathed, staring in awe. “Do they have shops for these things?”

He nodded. “Of course. Thousands of them here, each dedicated to a certain style and genre. There’s one dedicated to a specific species of flowers, there,” he pointed, and Rose craned her head to see the stained glass version of some brilliantly orange, spider-like flower with a black stem. He swung their connected hands between them cheerfully, eyes darting everywhere to take in everything at once, just like she was doing.

Eventually he led her over to the pet store, and a good hour was spent playing with the noseless dogs and earless cats. Like the humanoid natives of the world, the animals looked like they were made out of precious jewels and stones; an opal-hued dog with emerald eyes nuzzled her leg as an obsidian cat with ivory eyes curled up in the Doctor’s lap. He petted the animal with a smile, laughing whenever the whiskers came in contact with his hand. Rose had been surprised at first when one of the cats curiously wiggled the whiskers against her palm, sending a faint electrical charge that tickled more than anything. The same cat was currently lying across her shoulders, purring contentedly.

“I thought you said you didn’t like cats, Doctor,” Rose teased as he lifted a diamond kitten from the floor and cuddled it.

“They’re called Laraisha here, Rose, and besides; Earth cats aren’t vaguely telepathic. These Laraisha are far superior to your native species.”  
Rose rolled her eyes, but when the Doctor wasn’t looking, she snapped a photo with her phone and sent it to her mum and Mickey.

After the pet store, Rose began to search for a stained glass window in earnest; going to every store she could find to locate the perfect one. Several were ruled out immediately for being too alien, others for being too large or just not suiting her mum, until finally she settled on a blown glass figure that looked like an extravagant iris. It would look perfect on her mother’s window sill, and she also bought a large carved ball of crystal that would reflect the light and bathe her mum’s rooms in rainbows every morning when the sun came up. The shopkeeper thanked them profusely for their purchase, and they returned the gifts to the TARDIS before hitting the local sites.

The sun was sinking slowly behind the city, casting everything in a fiery glow as they sat side by side on a ledge at the top of a sapphire tower. Force fields prevented them from falling, but Rose still got intense vertigo if she looked down, and had wrapped one arm around the Doctor’s waist for security. One of his arms was draped across her shoulders, giving her a gentle squeeze every now and then to remind her that he had her.

“Today ‘s been lovely,” she sighed, her head leaning against his shoulder. He hummed happily in reply, legs swinging below him.

Rose tilted her head to look at him, heart pounding. The whole day seemed to have been building up to this, and she took a deep breath before saying, softly, “Kiss me.”

The Doctor froze. Rose, unperturbed, continued. “I mean it, Doctor. I… I want you to kiss me.”

He looked down at her, eyes hopeful, but expression hesitant. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” She said, decisively, and he studied her for another second before nodding.

Slowly, giving her enough time to back out if she wished, he brought his lips to hers. The kiss was soft, gentle, and reminded her of a shy boy kissing her goodnight after a first date. 

It was a comfort, but she wanted more. 

Her mouth parted slightly, and after a beat he copied her. Carefully she eased her tongue into his mouth as he waited, letting her take the lead and set the tempo. Rose explored his mouth with a languid curiosity, delighting in the extra bumps and ridges that didn’t exist in a human, and smiling inwardly as he shivered when she ran her tongue across the roof of his mouth. She traced his own tongue suggestively, teasing it into her own mouth, nudging at him until he finally began to explore on his own. 

Though he was slow in his exploration, he was thorough; it seemed by the time they broke apart, panting heavily, no surface had gone untouched. Rose rested her forehead against his neck, smiling, and he brushed a kiss over her hair.

“Ready to head back?” he asked. 

“Yeah.” He helped her up, and they walked back to the TARDIS in silence, but with new currents running between them. Rose was contemplative; the Doctor nervous and slightly hopeful. He had been ready to accept that Rose needed more time, and now it looked like she might have forgiven him. Even if she decided to stay friends, he would be happy with that; it meant that she would stay in his life.

They entered the TARDIS, and Rose gave him a smile and his hand a squeeze before she went over to the jump seat. He studiously avoided looking at the amount of leg on display as he sent the TARDIS into the vortex, and scanned the readouts briefly. “Everything’s fine with the TARDIS’s systems, seems like. Those wires are still holding together.” He turned to her with a smile. “Want a cuppa before you turn in?”

Rose stood, and with a look of purpose on her face she walked over to him and hugged him, hard. Bewildered, he hugged her back. “Hello.”

“Hi.” She looked up at him, nibbling her bottom lip; he swallowed, trying to ignore the feelings floating hopefully to the surface. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Anything, Rose.” He swept a stray hair behind her ear.

“Can we… well, actually, I want to know if you want to… only if you want to, mind, I don’t want to put pressure on you or anything, only this is important, and I’ve been thinking about this all day, well, more like a few days now, only I’ve just now got the courage to ask, and…”

“Rose.” His eyes crinkled in amusement. “Seems like you’re picking up bad habits. Babbling doesn’t really suit you, you know.”

She blushed, fingering the lapel of his coat. “Sorry. I was just wondering if we could, um… havesexagain.”

The Doctor blinked down at her, stunned, hardly daring to believe his ears. Rose stared intently at where she continued to play with the fabric. “You… mean that?” he finally asked, hesitantly, and Rose looked up and nodded shyly.

He sighed. “Oh, Rose. I do, but… are you absolutely sure?”

“Yeah. I… I need to prove to myself that you won’t hurt me again, Doctor. These past months have been wonderful, but… but I need to know.”

One hand came up to cup her cheek, his eyes searching hers. She kept her gaze on him, letting him see her honesty; remembering what he said about feeling her in the back of his mind, she focused on all the certainty and hope that she felt and concentrated on it. His face flickered, and he swallowed once more before stepping back. Holding out a hand, he said softly, “Come with me.”


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The final chapter! Thanks for everyone who read this, and keep an eye out for more stories in this 'verse!!

She took the hand without hesitating, and he led her down several corridors, up one flight of stairs, and taking more turns than she could hope to remember, sharing soft smiles and brief, shy kisses along the way. Finally, they reached what looked like a hole in the wall, and he gestured at it, a secret smile playing about his lips. “After you.”

Rose stared at it. “What is it?”

“You’ll see. Just… sit down.”

Mystified, she did so, and he urged her forward a little more until she was almost all the way in. “Doctor, what..?”

He shoved, and Rose shrieked as she flailed, and it took her a moment before she realized she was sliding. “You’re bonkers!” She screamed, not caring if he heard or not.

By the time she fell onto a massive cushion, she was breathless with laughter, crawling out of the way before he arrived, hooting and hollering all the while. He landed in a rather ungraceful sprawl, but he was laughing, and Rose rolled over to curl up against his side, giggling like mad.

When they finally calmed, Rose gave him a playful shove. “Only you would have a slide that went to your bedroom. Only you.”

The Doctor grinned. “It’s fun! And the TARDIS changes it every day, so I never know what to expect; there was a loop-de-loop once, which gave me more than a few bruises, but was the best one yet.” He bounded to his feet, helping her up. “I have a door, of course, but that’s too boring.”

Rose shook her head, taking the time to look around the room. It was surprisingly neat; either it meant that this Doctor was a closet neat freak, or it meant that he didn’t spend much time in it. She suspected the latter.

The carpet was a pale cream, thick and soft, and surprisingly springy. The furniture wasn’t so much carved as dreamed into existence, made of graceful angles with intricate and impossible designs etched and grown into the surface. Every flat surface was covered with gadgets and gizmos and the odd slice of toast, banana, sock, or tie. The walls were a deep navy blue, the ceiling a replica of a night sky. The bed, sitting inconspicuously in the corner, had a crimson duvet with golden, swirling designs on it, and the headboard had more of the Doctor’s mysterious language carved into it. A large, merrily crackling fireplace was directly opposite the bed, with a large plush armchair and a matching futon arranged in front of it. A crimson rug matching the duvet lay underneath. To her left she saw a partially-open door, and seeing tile assumed it was the bathroom. The door to the rest of the TARDIS was underneath the slide’s exit.

“As much as I would love to give you a grand tour,” the Doctor said, wryly, “I’m pretty sure the main attraction is very much not occupied.”

Rose giggled, and then turned to face him. She slipped her arms around the back of his neck, one hand playing with his hair. “I’m pretty sure that can be remedied.”

“Oh, I’m certain of it,” he grinned, but it soon faded. “I don’t want to push you, Rose. I don’t know what came over me that day, but I swear that if you don’t want to do this, I’ll pretend like it never happened.”

“I want to do this,” she replied, her voice sounding more confident than she felt. Inside she was a trembling mass of jelly, fear and uncertainty and an echo of pain still ricocheting through her (and she had a feeling he could sense it), but she needed this. She needed to prove that he wouldn’t hurt her ever again, that he meant it when he said he’d do anything to make it up to her. Rose knew this was the biggest leap of faith she had ever taken in her life, and that if it worked out, she would never doubt him again.

If it didn’t work… well, she wasn’t going to think about that. It would work. It would have to.

He leaned over to kiss her softly, only the lightest touch on her lips, but when she deepened it he allowed her to take control, gently holding her waist as her hands smoothed down to his chest to start removing buttons and revealing the vest below. He briefly regretted wearing so many layers, but what she was doing with her hands felt absolutely wonderful, especially when she tugged the tie and shirt free and played with the bit of skin she had unearthed in the process along his waistband. He shivered slightly, only returning the gesture when she nudged him purposefully. Sliding a hand under her top, he stroked the small of her back, not able to repress a smile when she gave out a tiny whimper.

Once his buttons were undone, Rose pushed both coat and jacket off his shoulders, and they landed with a louder clang than expected. He paused, remembering that he had some rather delicate instrumentation in there that really oughtn’t be thrown about like that, but Rose was once again pressing herself against him and peppering kisses along his freckles and suddenly he really wasn’t worried about any machinery that may or may not have turned on and was currently creating miniature soldiers that would wage war with the other contents of his pockets because he was otherwise distracted. The hand that was slowly stroking her back inched its way to her bra, where it fiddled with the clasp.

“Your hearts are beating faster than normal,” she murmured, as she nuzzled her way down his throat. He blinked down groggily at her.

“What?”

“Your hearts. They don’t normally beat this fast, even after running for our lives. It’s…odd.”

“Oh.” He hadn’t really thought she would notice, but given the frequency and nature of their hugs, it shouldn’t surprise him. “It’s the hormones… and yes, before you make any cheeky remarks, Time Lords have those too. We can just control them better.”

Rose assumed an innocent expression. “Wasn’t gonna say anything.”

He rolled his eyes affectionately before leaning down to snog her again.

After that, it was like a switch had been flipped; though he was still gentle, he no longer waited for her to make the next move. Her shirt was removed and tossed aside with reverence, and her bra soon followed that. He took a full minute to stare at her naked chest before she distracted him by removing his undershirt. They both gasped as their skin met each other, and Rose fancied she could faintly hear the quadruple thudding of his hearts.

It was as he was fumbling at the button on her shorts that Rose froze.

Suddenly, all she could think about was him pressing her against the pillar, hands bunching up the fabric of her nightgown, eyes dark and cold. It didn’t matter that in reality he had given a triumphant ‘Ha!’ as he got it undone and was touching her gently. She suddenly felt violated in the worst possible way, and she wrenched away from him, taking two steps backwards before finding herself at the edge of the mattress.

The Doctor’s hands were still suspended in mid-air. “Rose? You alright?”

“I…I just…” she shook her head, forcing the memory away. “Just… can you undress? I… I can’t, not right now.”

A brief flicker of pain crossed his face. “Yeah. Of course. Undressing… sounds like a good idea. I, er… right.”

He turned away from her, giving her (relative) privacy, and Rose felt the tension that had seized her ease. Releasing a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding, Rose shucked off her remaining clothing and crawled over the bed, resting cross-legged in the centre and watching him warily and eagerly.

He was tugging off his socks, still clad in his pants, hopping about as he removed them. Rose let out a small giggle, and he turned to grin at her, only to freeze as he took her in.

“Rose…” he breathed, and quickly made his way over to her.

Rose laid back as he joined her, stretching out beside her and taking her hand in his. Rose smiled shyly, trying to not fidget as he looked his fill. “You’re beautiful,” he said, sincerely, and her heart fluttered.

“So’re you,” she replied, honestly.

His smile was soft, and as he leaned over to kiss her, Rose found she was no longer scared.

As he trailed his hand down her skin in a whisper of a touch, she tangled her free hand in his hair, not able to get enough of it. He had such great hair; she wondered, briefly, what it would feel like tickling the insides of her thighs as she twisted and pulled, then about what his oral fixation would be doing… and promptly stopped the thought. That would be later, after things had cleared between them. For now… she gave a soft tug and heard a faint noise emerge from his throat, and she smiled. Pulling away, she pushed down, and he happily began to follow the trail his hand had carved, lingering only a moment at the spot that once held a bruise on her neck. He licked it, and feeling her shiver, made sure to replace it with a new one.

His mouth travelled lower, her hand still clasped in his. At the first contact of his mouth against her breast Rose moaned, and he smirked as he flicked her nipple playfully before taking it into his mouth. Unlike the last time, where teeth had pulled and twisted, only his lips and tongue came into contact with her skin. That didn’t mean it felt less pleasant, especially when his free hand came up to knead and fondle her other breast. Maybe it was the moment, maybe it was the man, or maybe it was because of Rose’s reassurance, but this sweet, slow seduction was driving her mad, and she wanted things to go faster.  
Taking matters into her own hands, Rose reached down, wiggled a bit, and cupped him.

The Doctor gasped, letting out a noise that would have embarrassed him in another time and place as she slowly slid her hand up and down. His hand tightened reflexively around hers and the breast he had previously been kneading, Rose arching her back into him and grinding her wrist against the length of him, hard. Taking in a ragged breath, he reached down and pulled her hand away.

“This’ll be finished too soon if you keep doing that,” he panted. “Alien, remember? Much more… sensitive.”

Rose grinned up at him. “Something to keep in mind for later, then.”

“You… you think there’ll be a later?”

She nodded. “I think so. I hope so. As soon as I prove to myself that it won’t happen again, I want to.”

He moved her hands above her head. “Oh, Rose. I want to, too.”

And with that, he kissed her, inveigling his way between her thighs, and Rose allowed him in.

His tongue stroked against hers, providing a tantalizing glimpse of what was to come as his hands took a more active role in his seduction. They ran down her arms to briefly tickle her armpits (Rose squirmed as he paused in kissing her to grin wolfishly at her, before sweeping her up in an even more stunning kiss), then tap-danced over her shoulder and up her neck before smoothing down her chest. Her breasts easily moulded to his hands as he squeezed and teased once more, her nipples straining for attention, and her skin flushed red by the time he moved on. Once at her stomach he searched for a ticklish spot, but Rose didn’t notice. Her hips had begun to rock upwards into him, trying to find that piece of him that would fit so well with her own. He pressed gently down on her hips as she broke away to suck in air, and he used the opportunity to suck and nibble at her earlobe. His hands remained where they were, thumbs lying distractedly on the top of her inner thigh, and she gasped out a ‘please’ as they began to move gently.

“Please what?” he murmured, and Rose would have smacked him if she wasn’t feeling so thoroughly aroused.

Instead she rocked up against him despite his warning, this time achieving her goal and grinning smugly as he gasped. “You’re still wearing pants,” she belatedly realized as she met warm, slightly damp cotton instead of cool, slightly damp flesh.

“A little distracted,” he muttered, before pushing himself upright. He gazed down at her a moment, eyes elongated but not nearly as serpentine as she remembered, before looking down at himself, frowning contemplatively. “Well, this poses a problem. I don’t want to move, and yet, I have to get these off. What a dilemma…”

Rose rolled her eyes, and with a jerk and a shove, she soon had him sprawled unceremoniously on his back as she crawled on top of him.

“Better?” she asked, sweetly.

He nodded enthusiastically. “Yes!” he squeaked.

“Good.” She proceeded to remove his pants, tossing the fabric over her shoulder before taking him in.

He allowed her to look, tucking his hands underneath his head to watch her. She cocked her head, realizing that he didn’t look any different than a human male, even if his penis just seemed different than normal. It was still long and slightly thick, but there was something about it that she couldn’t quite put her metaphorical finger on. She was all for getting her literal fingers on it, but something niggled in the back of her mind as she stared at it.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’d never seen one of those before,” he drawled, and Rose started, flushing slightly. She had almost forgotten he was there.

“Somethin’s… different about you. I dunno what, but there’s just something I can’t quite think of…”

He blinked at her for a moment before realization struck. “Oh! Oh, that. Time Lords don’t have foreskins, therefore no circumcision scars. We didn’t exactly, ah, use that organ, and if it weren’t for the fact that we would have an otherwise difficult time going to the bathroom as they couldn’t think of an easier way to do that, the genetic engineers on Gallifrey would have found a way to get rid of it. It still works, as you can obviously see, but that might be what you’re trying to figure out.”

As soon as he said it, Rose knew he was right. Both Mickey and Jimmy had been circumcised, so she’d seen the scar, but thought nothing of it. It was a silly thing to now recognize, in hindsight, but she had been so certain of him being alien in that aspect that she had been looking harder than normal, she supposed.

He continued to ramble on about reproduction on Gallifrey- something about Looms and genetic donors and triple-helixed DNA- while she slowly inched her way up his body, and he hardly seemed to notice when she settled on top of him. He certainly noticed when she took him in hand, his words trailing off into a strangled gurgle sound, head flopping uselessly back and hands fisting into the bedsheets.

His skin was still cool, but she could almost feel the blood pumping underneath and wondered if he was that much more sensitive because his skin was literally thinner here. The organ was also noticeably darker because of said blood flow, and as Rose stroked him she felt his skin quiver against her own. Actually, it was more like…

“Is it rippling?” she asked, slightly bemused.

The Doctor’s voice was strained when he answered. “Organ works a bit differently. No semen, just fluid- that’s one thing that they did, ah…” he trailed off when she squeezed.

Her voice was pleasant, and had he been in his right mind he would have been instantly suspicious. “They did what?”

She could tell he was gritting his teeth. “They, er, fiddled with the genes so that Time Lords couldn’t reproduce sexually. Rose, stop that!”

She pouted, but withdrew her hands. “I thought you liked it.”

“I like it too much,” he groaned. “And I hope you don’t mind terribly, but I’d rather come the first time with you, rather than like an excited teenager who can’t keep it in his pants.”

Rose giggled, but scooted forward obligingly before settling him temptingly against her entrance. Payback, she thought, for last time, only this was far more pleasant and gratifying. “Want this, then?” she asked, and he narrowed his eyes against the wicked little look in her own.

Taken completely by surprise when he whipped his hand over to grind his thumb against her clit, Rose let out a shocked, pleasure-filled cry that made him smile smugly as she rocked against him. “Ok, ok, I get it,” Rose gasped, and reached for him again. Though he made a low growl-moan as she adjusted him, his hands rested lightly on her waist and he even helped her to slide slowly down on him, both crying out as she sank down to his hilt.

“Doctor,” she gasped, clenching his arms. “My god…”

“No god here, just me,” he grunted back, eyes squeezed shut as he tried not to go off. His hormones were so out of control there was no hope of controlling them for even a split second, and his hearts felt like they were going to samba right out of his chest. As his brain whirled and fizzed and sparked like an over-heated machine, Rose rocked against him before adjusting to his size. “You’re… rippling again.” She breathed. “I can feel it.”

“In the old times, that meant it was testing if the woman was fertile,” he replied, seemingly getting himself under control enough to regain the energy for a lecture. “Not quite applicable here, even if I wasn’t sterile, since female Gallifreyans have specific receptors during their ovulation that you don’t have. Even if you were ovulating- which you aren’t, I could tell that much when I licked you- it would think you weren’t, since you don’t have those receptors, and therefore keep all the fertile sperm inside while I shot off blanks, for lack of a better term.”

Despite being torn between hugging him and wanting to tape his mouth shut, Rose found this entirely endearing. It was just so him, taking a moment to prove his brilliance and madness by feeling the need to lecture while in the middle of a crisis or life-changing event. Still, it reassured her on the whole ‘unprotected-sex-with-an-alien’ front. “So even if you could conceive children naturally, we couldn’t?”

“Nope. Not without outside help, at least.” He peered curiously up at her. “Why, you want children?”

“God, no!” she exclaimed, horrified. “’M only twenty-one!”

He pouted. “Then why are we having a chat rather than, you know, proceeding with the intercourse?”

Rose burst out laughing. “You started it!” She continued moving against him, though, much to their mutual appreciation.

It took a moment to regain their ardour that had faded from their impromptu discussion, but soon enough they were grappling at each other, Rose lying nearly on top of him as she squirmed and wriggled and manoeuvred him into position for maximum pleasure, and he wedging a hand between them to brush against her clit every time she pushed forward. They were both whispering filthy things to each other, Rose groaning about how she would take him in her mouth, him saying in explicit detail what he was going to do between her thighs next time he had her on her back (or in the shower, he wasn’t picky, and doesn’t steam and water and slick skin against slick skin sound divine, Rose?)

It certainly sounded divine in the way he said it, and Rose soon found herself coming with a scream, fireworks and supernovas passing through her mind, and the Doctor followed a moment later as he pressed his hips up against hers and they froze in time for eternity before crashing back down, sweaty and spent, arms and legs tangled about each other and gasping ‘I love you’ into each other’s ears and hearts.

Rose spoke as she regained the coherency to talk. “Well, you really did make me scream, after all.”

He chuckled. “Better late than never. You ok?”

“Wonderful. You?”

“Brilliant.”

They lounged for a while longer, Rose snuggled up against him as he pulled the covers over them, shuffling them over a bit so that the wet spot would go undisturbed. For some reason he was rather pleased with that physical evidence of their act, and decided that he wanted to replicate it at some time in the near future.

“Doctor?” Rose asked as he was part-way through making plans for a repeat. “What was with the sudden change of heart?”

“What do you mean?” he replied, inwardly debating between getting her orange orchid-like flowers from Yerbis or traditional red roses from Earth, despite it being cliché.

Rose shifted, and he noticed she was looking at his bare chest, bottom lip between her teeth. He felt momentarily jealous. “’S just… before, when we did this last time… you weren’t your normal self. It was like… it was like someone else had taken over your body, and it just wasn’t you.”

At her words he had tensed, hands gripping her tighter to him and eyes darkening in pain. “I don’t… I don’t know, Rose. I was searching for you for a long time, and by the time I found you I had worked myself into a right state, believing that you were going to leave me or that you had already left. I couldn’t feel you in my head, Rose, and it felt so much like the time after Gallifrey burned that I… you saved me, you know that? Saved me from the madness in my mind, saved me from the silence, the loneliness, and the despair. With your presence missing from my mind, I could feel that madness encroaching on me once more, and I couldn’t handle it. I would have done anything to get you back, and when it seemed like I wouldn’t be able to, something just snapped.” He leaned his forehead against the top of her head, breathing in the faint smell of her shampoo and the lingering scent of sweat, sex and musk. “I don’t know what came over me, Rose, and had I known what was to happen, I would have never gone near you, let alone raped you.”

There it was, the magic word; the word both of them had refused to think about, scared of what it meant and how it would change them.

Rose didn’t reply for a moment, breathing evenly against him, her breath fluttering over the skin of his chest. Her fingers, resting against his clavicle, curled slightly. “I was hurt by what you did, but even I was off, Doctor. I never… even after Reinette, I would have never left you. But I got to thinking after I got there and it just seemed so right to assume that you didn’t love me, and so I just gave up. And I’m sorry, for scaring you. I didn’t know.”

“It’s not your fault. What I did was wrong, and given half the chance, I’ll spend the rest of your life making it up to you, Rose Tyler. You, my precious girl, are worth that and more.”

Rose moved to look at him, dislodging his chin but smiling broadly. “I love you, too.”

He laughed, and rolled over to kiss her properly.

It was as he was nuzzling his way down her chest that he sat up abruptly. “Why, you little sneak!” He exclaimed at the ceiling, and the TARIDS hummed smugly.

“What? What is it?” Rose asked, struggling to get up.

The Doctor continued to glare at the ceiling. “That second dial, in the room, remember? The first one was a psychic dampener- it was what prevented me from feeling you in my mind, no doubt set by the TARDIS to allow you to hide. But the second one was an emotional aggressor. It takes whatever mood you are most strongly feeling and amplifies it over a period of time. Amplify it too much at once and you could die of the sudden hormone imbalance, but over time it’s harder to overcome and recognize. The TARDIS set it at maximum to get it out of our systems.”

Rose could have asked a number of questions- why the TARDIS felt the need to interfere, why he didn’t recognize what it was, why he even had it in the first place- but instead, she asked, “So we could use it in a better way?”

He looked at her curiously. “What do you mean?”

“Well, it’s like you said,” she shrugged. “Heightens the current emotion. So, say we snogged each other silly beforehand and walked in with thoughts of shagging each other. Wouldn’t it, I dunno, heighten the arousal or something?”

For a moment he was silent, staring at her in silent awe. “What?” she demanded, after she began to worry that so much prolonged silence would cause something in him to collapse under the strain or something equally as bad.

“Rose Tyler, you are a genius.” He proclaimed. “An evil, sex-addicted genius, but a genius nonetheless.”

She grinned at him placing her tongue between her teeth and watching his eyes darken once more. “Well, one of us has to be.”

He continued to smile at her before her words registered. “Oi! What do you mean?”

Rose rolled out of bed, giggling, but didn’t answer as she made her way to the bathroom.

“Rose?” he called from the bed. “What did you mean?”

She paused by the door, giving him a coquettish look over her shoulder. “Shower with me?”  
The look on his face promised the conversation wasn’t over, but he joined her in the shower anyway. Minutes later, as she made good on her promise and slowly tortured him with her mouth and hands, he realized that it didn’t matter what she thought, so long as she trusted him enough to stay with him.

“I love you,” he said later, as they curled up under the covers to sleep.

“I love you, too,” she whispered back, as the TARDIS sang them softly to sleep.  



End file.
